BJP government must realise Tagore’s vision

The swearing-in of West Bengal’s first BJP government on Rabindra Jayanti is not merely symbolic politics. It is a civilisational correction.

- TUHINA SINHA

For far too long, Bengal - the cradle of India’s intellectual and spiritual renaissance - was governed by regimes that seemed deeply disconnected from the very ethos that once made the state a cultural torch bearer. The significance of a BJP government taking oath on the birth anniversary of Rabindranath Tagore lies precisely in this: Bengalis attempting to rediscover its soul. Bengal is the land of Ishwar Chandra Vidyasagar, who challenged social evils through enlightened reforms. It is the land of Ramakrishna Paramahamsa and Swami Vivekananda, who infused India with spiritual confidence and national awakening. The land of Tagore, whose poetry elevated freedom from a political aspiration to a civilisational ideal.

Yet under Mamata Banerjee, Bengal increasingly resembled a state inspired less by its sages and reformers and more by the politics of Huseyn Shaheed Suhrawardy - where intimidation, communal appeasement and suppression of political opponents became normalised instruments of governance.

The post-poll violence of 2021 remains one of independent India’s darkest democratic stains. BJP workers were hunted, homes torched, women assaulted and entire villages terrorised because citizens dared to vote against the ruling party. Bengal ceased to be a democracy governed by law and increasingly became a territory controlled through fear.

The TMC ecosystem did not merely tolerate criminality, it politically weaponised it.

Nothing exposed this degeneration more brutally than Sheikh Shahjahan and the horrors of Sandeshkhali. The allegations of systematic intimidation and exploitation emerging from Sandeshkhali shook the nation. Yet for months, the ruling establishment appeared more invested in protecting political interests than ensuring justice for vulnerable women.